


On The Fantasies of Moonlight

by MintChocolateLeaves



Series: In the Nature of Things [2]
Category: Magic Kaito, 名探偵コナン | Detective Conan | Case Closed
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Drama & Romance, F/M, Getting Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2019-10-24 15:51:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17707175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MintChocolateLeaves/pseuds/MintChocolateLeaves
Summary: Aoko deserves someone who won’t lie to her, someone who won’t be selfish with her. And Kaito…?Kaito is selfish.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Someone asked for a KaiAo vers. of my fic, 'On The Nature of Daylight' and I've had some fun writing it. So finally, at long last, here's part one.

“I welcome you home bearing gifts,” Kaito says, the moment he hears the door open. It’s a small scratching sound, and he turns, glances out to the walkway until Aoko appears. She’s wearing her work uniform, having come straight from the station, and her expression upon seeing him, is disgruntled.

Kaito isn’t much of a fan of the police – especially disgruntled police – but he is a fan of Aoko, and the fan of the way her uniform compliments her figure, so he assumes that it’s alright to like one police officer at least.

His amusement at her confusion is warranted. Maybe.

“How come,” Aoko says, by way of bewildered greeting, “you constantly break into my apartment, even though you know I have the capability to arrest you?”

It’s a good question. Most sane people wouldn’t even dare, not even if they are best friends with the officer in general, but Kaito isn’t most people. He’s also, a little insane, but that’s a thought for another day.

Plus, he knows that Aoko isn’t actually as bothered by the break in as it might sound to someone else. She’s not weary – heck, it’s likely that she thinks Kaito has just scoured the outside of the apartment, looking for the spare key to let himself inside.

 _(His fingers ache, wanting to dart into his pocket and snatch up his lock-pick set. He doesn’t go anywhere near it though, out of a self-preservation, because Aoko would be smart enough to conclude that he really_ had _broken in, if she saw the tools.)_

Kaito grins. “You wouldn’t arrest me.”

Well, he’s not completely sure that’s true. If she knew enough about his previous work history, she very well might.

“At least,” he continues, “not when I’ve brought you food.”

He’s set plates on the table, each with takeout food on them. Kaito’s tried to set it up as a gourmet meal but there are only so many ways he can place food and no amount of fancy setup is going to make McDonalds look amazing.

Still, he’s gone all out in trying. Aoko’s back later than expected – he’d had a bit of time to play around with. And so, the food had been freed from its paper bag and is set up.

“And that’s the only reason you’re not in cuffs,” Aoko laughs, comes forward to meet him. She leaves her bag on the side, and then, collapses into the chair opposite him on the table.

She lacks the amount of grace to make the movement seem magnetic, but still, Kaito’s lips curl upward anyway.

Then, Aoko leans forward, eyes widening. She pauses, takes a second to try to register what she’s seeing – then two – before blinking away the confusion.

“Did – Did you put _chocolate milkshake_ into my wine glasses?”

Lips tugging up, Kaito offers another grin. It’s wild, almost untamed in nature, as Aoko stares in childish wonder, as if this is the best thing that has happened to her all day.

Considering her career in the justice system, setting out to capture anyone who crosses the theft division, Kaito wouldn’t be too surprised if this _has_ been the best part of her day.

“ _Lait au chocolat,”_ he says, around a short laugh. Aoko joins in too, her shoulders shaking as she reaches up and curls her hair back around her ear.

“You’re ridiculous,” she says, “absolutely ridiculous.”

“Oh please,” Kaito says, waving to the meal in front of them. A combination of fries, cheese burgers and milkshake await them. “You love it.”

It’s almost as if the temperature drops.

Kaito shivers, watches as Aoko’s lips purse, tightening around the edges, as she tears her gaze away, towards the food he’s laid out for her. She focuses on her plate, pulls it forward and refuses to look at him.

Alright, so maybe Kaito shouldn’t have said the ‘L’ word. _Love._ Horrible word, that is, Kaito thinks. He should know by now that saying it only ever makes things awkward between them.

Aoko shifts in her seat, grabs a few fries and effectively stops herself from bringing anything up by ripping the potato in two between her teeth.

Wow, he’s such an idiot.

Because he’d rather distract himself than admit to his idiocy though, Kaito simply leans forward and grabs a fry of his own and watches Aoko, waiting to see how she’ll act. He blinks, imagines how the conversation could derail into something… else, and decides that maybe he shouldn’t let this particular topic evolve.

They need a distraction before things get weird.

“So, how was… work?”

Ah, fuck.

He’s gone and made it weird.

Aoko raises an eyebrow. “You never ask me about work. In fact, you specifically set out _not_ to ask, why was it? Routine questions only lead to routine conversations, and they bore you?”

That’s the _official_ reason that Kaito tends to go with, yes. But really, he supposes it’s only because hearing about Aoko’s job means hearing about other _thieves_ and that’s not really something Kaito wants to do.

As a reformed thief himself, Kaito tries to stay clear of anything that might lead to any sort of… temptation. It’s not that he doesn’t trust himself, not to do the wrong thing, in fact, it’s not down to trust at all. Kaito is pretty calm in admitting to himself that if he decided never to commit a crime again, he’d commit to the sentiment.

It’s just, hearing about other criminals means that Kaito is only going to start judging the way they’ve gone about things, planning out how _he_ could have done it better and more efficiently.

Which, well, probably not a good thing to start musing about at the dinner table with a _cop._ Really brings the whole concept of being _reformed_ into question.

Not the sort of mental acrobatics he wants to navigate over McDonalds and evening conversations.

“Well,” Kaito says, “it’s not routine conversation if I never ask now, is it?”

Aoko’s eyebrow quirks even higher, somehow. She can’t exactly argue that his logic is incorrect, even if it _is_ flawed.

“So – work. You’re late home, makes me wonder how it went.”

Aoko’s canines dig into her lip, and she scoops up more fries to give herself something to do. After a moment, finally, she shrugs her shoulders and says, “Mostly the same as usual. Although there is this one case that’s a little tricky because the guy, we’re trying to catch is… a real troublemaker.”

Tricky? A troublemaker? Sounds like Kaito’s kind of guy. Sign him up for a meeting, ready the coffee because he wants to sit down and talk about how this guy is stressing the police out.

“Tricky how?”

Aoko scrunches her nose. He can practically see the cogs turning in her mind, trying to decide how much can be said about an open case. Another reason not to ask – Kaito never gets any of the juicy details until the police have closed the case and that’s not… interesting at all.

Maybe it’s a little disappointing, because Kaito usually takes the side of the criminal. No one wants to be caught because they wanted a little adrenaline.

“Well,” Aoko says at last, voice slow and cautious, “they’re arrogant and they stole away with a famous piece of artwork. Left a calling card too, taunting us into catching them before they pass the artwork on to their fence.”

No wonder she’s been working late.

Kaito scrunches his nose.

And he judges.

Maybe the criminal inviting the police to play sits a little too close to home, but it does catch his attention. KID had always wanted to involve the police in his heists, and that’s because the theft had always been half a show and half a crime. The best sort of theft, in his opinion.

He lifts his gaze from Aoko’s and takes a moment to stare at the clock. He can almost hear the ticking from the second hand.

“Reminds me of KID,” he says, “except, well, this guy seems more of a coward to me.”

Aoko raises an eyebrow. She’s been privy to his conversations on KID multiple times in the past, his inflated ego although, to her, it’s probably always seemed more like fanboying. She’s probably not even surprised that he’s bringing it back up again, because theft always seems to bring back talk of KID.

So that’s not what she’s judging him for.

“Coward?”

“Sure, yeah,” Kaito shrugs. He lifts his wine glass, clinks it with Aoko’s and takes a sip. Chocolate bursts against his tongue and it’s _fucking heavenly._ Sometimes Kaito likes being an adult, simply because he can sit back with chocolate milkshake, sipping at it like he’s a wine taster or something – and no one judges him for it. It’s great, standard.

What a life he is living.

“He’s a coward.” Kaito continues. “If you’re going to challenge the police, then you challenge them before you take anything, not _after_ you’ve done it. Preposterous.”

It’s like telling someone to catch you in a game of tag but omitting the fact that you’ve bought a motorbike and the chaser needs to run. The playing field simply isn’t even.

He can’t respect it.

Aoko sighs, shakes her head. She says, “We both know that KID had a weird method with his challenges. He’s not entirely sane, Kaito. This thief’s challenge falls more in the norm.”

The norm can go fuck itself then. It’s boring and it lacks any of the boldness that is included in a thief’s showmanship.

“Still a coward,” Kaito says. He shakes his head, sticks out his tongue because apparently, he’s still childish enough to do this. He only receives another sigh, as if the conversation is a chore, as if he’s being completely unreasonable.

Kaito is not being _completely_ unreasonable. Only moderately unreasonable – there’s a difference.

“Fine. Sure. He’s a coward,” Aoko relents. Kaito preens at the confirmation. “But he’s a coward who’s walked away with Gyokudo’s _‘Parting Spring’._ He’ll be rich if he manages to find a seller.”

Kaito stills.

Then, he visibly tells himself it’s probably not good to inquire just _how_ rich someone who sold the painting would be, that it’s not something he’s expected to say in this situation.

Although, he almost wants to take away the coward statement now.

Kaito’s spent enough time wondering how he’d steal the paintings before, if he were to decide to. He’s spent daydreams imagining how he’d get in and out of the national museum of modern art without being caught, without triggering any alarms or letting anyone know a robbery was being carried out.

Perfectly normal behaviour, Kaito knows.

He wants to know what options this thief went with. How he went about doing it.

“Ah,” he says, and because he’s got a condition called _being a fucking idiot,_ he adds, “how’d he manage it?”

Aoko glowers.

Kaito concludes that maybe there was too much intrigue in his voice, that maybe it’s not best for him to show how impressed he is by the crime. Or, maybe Aoko is simply salty about the entire case.

Who knows? Not him.

“I don’t want to continue talking about the case during my hours off,” Aoko says. “I talk about it plenty at work. And, I can see the way this is much to interesting to you – smart tricks are all you really love, right?”

(Sometimes, Kaito thinks that it’s terribly unfair that she can say the word love without things becoming weird, but eh, there’s no changing it now.)

Her statement is not altogether true. He loves Aoko true, although he can’t exactly tell her that. Even if he knows how she’d respond, knows that she’d accept his confession in a heartbeat, because she’s long since offered her own.

“You caught me,” Kaito says, an easy smile sliding onto his face. It’s false, but it’s natural enough to deceive. “Might as well arrest me now.”

Aoko grins.

* * *

Kaito isn’t really sure how he reached decided that he wouldn’t accept the love confession Aoko had thrown his way, but since he made it, he’s stuck to it.

It’s not like there’s no logic behind the decision. He knows _why_ he made such a decision, why he turned around and vowed that this was the best way forward. Kaito’s not a masochist, he doesn’t want to torture himself by denying the happiness Aoko’s love would bring.

Of course not.

He dreams of her sometimes, of what it would be like. And it’s nice, it really is, but Kaito has always known the difference between dreams and reality.

Furthering their relationship, deepening it would only force them further apart. It would include too much lying, more than Aoko would deserve – since there shouldn’t even be a single lie – and Kaito can’t risk that. He doesn’t want to deceive her.

Aoko deserves someone who won’t lie to her, someone who won’t be selfish with her.

And Kaito…?

Kaito _is_ selfish.

He can’t tell her about his previous exploits, not when KID is the one person she wants to catch most. He can’t share that side to himself, and so it’s a hidden part to him that she’ll never have access to.

How horrible of him.

Even knowing that he should give Aoko a yes or a no, some resemblance of an answer to the words she’d muttered to him months ago, he can’t. The words tangle, freeze in his throat before he can say either – because, he wants things to stay the way they are.

Even if everything is fucked and it makes them both feel awkward, like there’s a heavy air around them. Kaito doesn’t want Aoko to move on, even if that’s the best option.

He’s self-centered like that.

It’s not healthy, he _knows that,_ but he’s not a good person. He knows he’s not, because else he would let Aoko free herself from him. He’d give her the chance to move on, he’d tell her why, he’d make things _work._

But he wants her to keep loving him.

And because Aoko is selfless, his opposite, she lets him take advantage of it. She thinks she’s giving him space to decide, when really, she’s giving him time to delude himself.

* * *

They catch the thief.

Aoko leads the team that brings him in, cornering him following a tip on his whereabouts, and it’s another thief that Aoko’s caught, another person who’s taken the spot Kaito could find himself trapped in one day.

Since catching thieves is a good thing for her department, naturally, Aoko wants to celebrate. Kaito’s phone lights up with an invitation, asking him to join their celebration, to tell her well done. A night out drinking in a bar frequented by cops – a reckless idea, truly.

No sane criminal with warrants to his name would even consider it.

Which means, of course, that Kaito has to do it. He’d be a coward not to.

(Let it be known, that Kuroba Kaito – Kaitou KID – is not necessarily _sane.)_

Flipping the collar on his favourite jacket, looking like what he hopes will translate as a _hot mess,_ Kaito wills himself the courage to head inside. One blink, then another, and then, he walks into a pit of justice-eating vultures.

“Kaito!” Aoko calls the second he steps inside, a blur in motion as she throws herself into his arms. Kaito’s surprised that she’s managed to catch sight of him so quickly, finds himself hoping she’s been watching the door for him. “You came!”

She’s clearly started drinking without him. Kaito’s going to have to find a way to catch up and quickly.

“You really doubted I would?”

“Oh, well,” Aoko pulls a face, exaggerated mistrust and confusion that makes him shudder. “I never know whether you’ll show up after a case. You always get so finnicky when I ask you to spend time with a bunch of the police.”

Well then.

He’s basically reaffirmed that Aoko is a _‘no-secrets-among-the-living’_ kind of drunk.

“That’s because,” Kaito says, “I am a menace to society. And I prefer not being caught.”

It’s the truth, yes, but Aoko is drunk enough to think he’s simply playing around with her. She’s not at the point where she’s listening out for any hidden meanings in his voice.

Her laughter is joyous, loud and bell-like. It’s enough to defuse any seriousness in his tone.

A hand on Aoko’s back makes her move beside him, tucked into his side, as they make their way towards the bar. Signalling the server, he offers a smile. “What’s your poison tonight, Aoko?”

As soon as she lets him know she’s drinking beer, he pays, passing her a glass. Her eyes light up, dipping in a grin.

“For the successful officer. Let’s poison ourselves together, okay?”

She doesn’t deny him. She won’t, he knows that.

* * *

In hindsight, maybe he drinks more than is a good idea.

One too many beers and Kaito feels like maybe he stepped over a line he shouldn’t have. Kaito has always had the skill of managing not to look as drunk as his is – it’s the beauty of perfecting the poker face – but it doesn’t mean his inhibitions don’t change like anybody else’s.

He still becomes reckless, still becomes loose-lipped. It’s not really a good combination for the semi-reformed thief, Kaitou KID, but he is drunk, and a little bit insane, so he’s not as worried as he maybe should be.

“Bakaito,” Aoko grumbles, catching his attention. He turns just in time to watch her slide into the seat beside his, leaning her head against his shoulder. Grumpiness curls her lips, creases her eyebrows, and he grins despite himself. “You’ve been ignoring me all night.”

He’s not been. Kaito knows that he hasn’t – he’s just been paying attention to all her colleagues, people he’s been conversing with since Aoko has been forcing his introductions.

“Oh,” he says, quirking an eyebrow, “you want me to pay attention to you, do you?”

Aoko’s expression morphs almost instantly. She’s too drunk to feel awkward, any strange emotions created when they approach the topic shielded with the help of alcohol. Her features soften, as Aoko finally admits, “I always want you to pay attention to me.”

His chest tightens. It feels almost like his heart is clenching – or no, maybe someone is clenching his heart inside their first, digging their fingers into the muscle and _squeezing._

Kaito wants to say that he always notices, is always watching, paying attention but that seems like too much of an answer.

Avoiding eye contact, he forces his lips into a smirk and says, “I can’t pay attention to you all the time, you’d get bored.”

Aoko reaches forward with more speed than someone drunk should be able to possess, grabbing hold of his wrist and pulling him closer to her. She’s too close – closer now than when she’d simply been leaning. Her nose practically grazes his, her breath on Kaito’s cheek.

“Never,” she breathes, “I’d never get bored of you.”

Despite himself, Kaito flushes.

Maybe if he hadn’t, if he’d kept the flush from rising up his neck, past his cheeks, Aoko would back down. But his face is red, and Aoko takes it as a hint to keep going.

“Kaito, I–”

_Please don’t say it._

“I love you,” Aoko whispers. The words are hopeful, but there’s a lingering sadness there too. As if she doesn’t know how to feel, whether she’s allowed to love him. Her expression is much the same.

It hurts.

“I know you do.”

“I love you so much,” Aoko says, and she blinks away tears. Kaito pretends he can’t see them. “So much that it aches, that I wish there were a cure. Every time I think I’ve found it, it’s just another faux cure, it’s not real.”

There is only one cure to love, Kaito thinks, and that’s heartbreak. It’s a cruel man’s medicine, but perhaps it’s crueller not to offer the cure at all.

“Aoko–”

“I just need an answer,” Aoko mumbles. She wipes at her face with the back of her sleeve. “Just once. A yes or a no, I don’t think that’s too much to ask, is it? Just don’t leave me wondering, don’t leave me hoping you’ll say yes.”

Kaito reels back, tries to escape but Aoko’s grip on his wrist is too firm to allow for any type of retreat. He’s been avoiding this.

He imagines the outcome of each response and all he can see is disaster. And maybe he’s catastrophising everything but there’s no one he can talk to who can prove that he’s not, so the ache in his chest simply _grows_ and – and Aoko’s hand around his wrist feels like steel.

“Aoko, _please–”_

“It’s easy – one syllable, please, just, this once–”

Why does his blood feel so cold? Why does his chest cavity feel so hollow? Is this how it feels to break? To be forced to decide when either answer leads to more suffering.

“No–” Kaito flinches. “Yes – Fuck, Aoko, _I don’t know.”_

“You can’t not know!” Aoko cries. “You may pretend not to feel things, but I know you, I _see you,_ and you’re someone who understands his feelings very easily, so don’t lie to me.”

Trapped. He feels trapped, and like an animal stuck in a corner, he feels illogical, irrational anger rise up his throat. Like bile it burns, but he’s not sick, just tired, angry – at himself, at the situation, at Aoko for forcing his answer.

“What do you want from me Aoko?” He hisses.

Aoko opens her mouth, but Kaito doesn’t let her speak.

“You want me to pick you? Choose you? Love you?” He can’t look at her, not in the eye. “Well I do, okay? I love you. It was always going to be you. Of course, it was. There’s no one I’ll love as much as I love you – it’s quite literally going to ruin me.”

She gapes. Then, “Kaito–”

He leans forward, brings a hand to Aoko’s chin and lifts her up. Meeting Aoko’s gaze, he breathes, “You will ruin me Aoko, and I would ruin you, and that’s not _fair.”_

“I don’t care,” Aoko whispers. “It’s not just your decision – ruin me if you want, I’m more than capable of piecing myself back together.”

Kaito is too drunk to argue her logic. He shudders, leans forward and presses his lips against hers.

Closing his eyes, Kaito presses closer. He feels almost like he’s falling apart. Maybe if Aoko holds him tightly enough he’ll stay in one piece.

She tastes of disaster.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. I finished part two. I don’t know if I’ll manage to finish the fic within part three, or whether I’ll need to add a fourth part into it, but I doubt you guys mind either way. Please enjoy!

Kaito wakes up to a dry mouth and the tingling of regret on his tongue.

He’d made a mistake last night, drinking as much as he had, toeing the line and then vaulting across it without a thought as to why he’d not crossed it in the first place. Admitting the truth to Aoko, giving in when he’s capable of being a stubborn force to be reckoned with, was…

He shouldn’t have let himself do it.

But he had, and now, he is lying, staring up at his ceilings and counting cracks in the paint. He needs to repaint the ceiling, something a little softer in colour from white, a beige or some natural pastel brown, maybe. He doesn’t know what colour, but he needs something new.

Confessing to Aoko was a mistake.

Not because it made her feel happy, gosh, her happiness is never a mistake, even if it tears him apart too, but because he knows it will lead to his own downfall. Because now, he knows what Aoko’s lips taste like, knows how soft they are, apart from the edges, where she’s bitten into them when she was younger, the skin a little tougher.

“I’m fucked,” Kaito mumbles to himself, throwing his arm up and covering his eyes. The cracks in his ceiling reminds him too much of the cracks in himself. “I’m well and truly fucked.”

His phone buzzes beside him, and he knows without answering that it’s  _her,_ that she’s phoning to talk about his answer yesterday, to see if he’d been serious or not. To hear him say he was.

Because they’re not fools, neither of them. Aoko may not know when he’s lying to her, he’s good enough that sometimes it borders on  _saddening,_ but she would know on this. She’d see it in his eyes, somehow.

Aoko may not know some parts of him, but she does know most of him. She knows parts of him that Kaito’s tried to hide away, sees the emotions he hides away whether he wants her to or not.

She sees him, even when Kaito wants to hide away.

He literally needs to become someone else if he doesn’t want her to see him.

Maybe that’s a plan for how to deal with this, to dress up in a separate identity for the foreseeable future, until Aoko forgets about their conversation, and become someone else. Even if it’s just for a single day he could–

No.

Becoming someone else is one step closer to KID, and isn’t that the one thing he’s trying to move on from?

He doesn’t regret those days, of course not, he’d grown from them, learnt to deal with loss and use up the endless energy that had swam inside him ever since his father had passed away, but they’re over with. Kaito can’t fall back on them every time life becomes a little… uncomfortable.

Because he is uncomfortable.

About all of this. He’s uncomfortable with lying to the one person he wants by his side the most, with denying them both what they want because of a decision he’d made eight years ago and has had to live with since.

He’ll cope, because who is Kaito not to? He’s survived bullets and evil organisations, so he should be able to survive this, even if this hurts more than a bullet.

Fuck.

Kaito pushes himself out of bed, leaves his phone unanswered on his bedside table, and heads out of his bedroom.

He’s always been good at dealing with thing when he’s got a plan, but Kaito’s best work comes when he’s improvising, and he thinks, faintly, that maybe he should follow as such with this whole… situation.

So Kaito opens his bedroom door and decides that improve will be his plan moving forwards. He figures things can’t get much worse than they already are now.

* * *

Things get worse than they already are now.

Not really, but well, there’s a banging at Kaito’s door about two hours later and Kaito knows that opening the door will make things worse. In like, a –  _she’s going to murder me for not answering her calls –_ way.

He lowers the paintbrush he’d been using, wipes a smidge of paint from his fingertips against his shirt, and heads towards his door. The door is locked, the chain on the latch, and part of him is surprised he’d even bothered. Maybe as a precaution in case Aoko tried to force her way inside with the key he’d given her years ago.

Who knows?

Kaito doubts that Aoko’s ever actually used the key he’s given to her. They usually congregate at her house rather than his apartment. She’s probably only been her three or four times. Maybe because unlike him, she’s always been one for respecting boundaries.

He unlatches the door, opens his door and quirks an eyebrow.

Aoko, understandably so, stands in front of him, cheeks red and flushed. For a moment, he thinks it’s the result of embarrassment. But then he realises that she’s breathing heavily too.

She’d probably been in a rush to get here.

“Do you know,” Aoko says, after a moment, as he watches her try to catch her breath. “That I’d forgotten which of these buildings you were in, and which floor, because you’re always breaking into  _mine.”_

Kaito’s answering grin is sardonic. He says, “Would’ve thought you’d realise it was building fourteen, apartment twelve. The numbers are very easy to remember.”

Kaito is not ashamed to admit that he’d pushed for the apartment when he’d realised the numbering system. He’d been adamant, once he’d realised the irony of KID living in the numbered apartment: B1412.

Is it pushing things, and his own ego to be living in 1412, maybe? But it’s something that leaves Kaito snickering every so often.

“Fanboy,” Aoko says after a second, and her lip curls as she says it, as if being a KID fanboy is something the be revered. Well, frankly, Kaito likes his fans. They’d always been so much fun during his heists. He’d even got them to help him, that one time, and that’d been amusing, mainly because they’d not realised until he’d left with the gemstone.

“Guilty,” Kaito says, raising his hands. And then, after a second more of watching her, he adds. “What’re you doing here, Aoko?”

Aoko flushes and lifts a hand up to poke him in the chest. He tilts back on the back of his feet, then adjusting his balance to bounce back.

“You didn’t answer my calls,” she says, after a second. It’s difficult to tell if she’s more upset or angry at the lack of response. Kaito doesn’t really want to hear either emotion, so he tries to ignore them, to forget they were there in the first place. “You’re ignoring me.”

“I wouldn’t have opened my door to you if I were ignoring you.” Kaito says after a second. He debates whether to wave her into the house – that means then, they’re sort of required to talk – but Aoko doesn’t give him the time to debate, walks in before he can conclude which.

“It would seem not,” Aoko says after a second. She kicks her shoes off, replaces them with a pair of slippers she’d brought with her – Kaito doesn’t have a spare pair, and Aoko knows him well enough to know he wouldn’t pick them up – “but my phone calls…?”

“I must have left my phone in my bedroom this morning,” Kaito lies, and then, because the one thing he doesn’t want to do is lie,  _that’s the whole point of this entire situation,_ he sighs. “I did leave it in my room.”

“You answered me yesterday,” Aoko says, and Kaito isn’t so stupid as to simply  _forget that._ He knows that he did. It sucked, being open with his feelings. “But you weren’t happy about me forcing you too. I guessed that you were avoiding me because of it.”

Kaito pulls a face.

 _Don’t lie,_ his subconscious warns him, waving a finger at his nose. Kaito kind of wants to kick his subconscious for telling him what to do, even if it, kind of right in what it’s saying.

“That’s why I left it in my room.”

Aoko reels back, and Kaito aches at the hurt in her eyes. He follows her into his sitting room, leaves her there for a second to process his words, and heads into his kitchen.

He returns with two glasses of aloe-vera juice, placing the glasses on the small table by his couch. And then, instead of sitting, he heads towards the canvas he’s been working on, to the easel that keeps it propped up away from the floor.

“Sorry,” Kaito says, “I didn’t want to lie to you about it.”

Aoko sighs, and he can feel her gaze watching his back, even as he picks back up his brush, glancing at the paint palette that’s gone forgotten on the table. He grabs the palette too.

“Why didn’t you want to answer me?” Aoko’s always been someone to go straight for the jugular, and that doesn’t stop just because the answer has been torn from his throat. “You said something about us ruining each other, but I don’t understand.”

Kaito grimaces.

He takes a moment to try and find the right words, something to make her understand, something that means he doesn’t need to vocalise what he’s truly hiding but comes up short.

He focuses on his painting instead, adds some more black onto the canvas, silhouetting ravens against a background of bright, pastel colours.

“Kaito,” Aoko continues. And then, because he doesn’t respond, her voice sharpens. “Don’t I deserve an answer?”

“I gave you an answer,” Kaito responds, and he turns, eyes wild, paintbrush sending a violent line of paint across the canvas, as he faces her. He supposes that he’s snarling, turning to a defensive sort of answer. “I gave you your answer yesterday, when you  _forced it out of me.”_

Aoko’s brow furrow, pulling down into a glare. She says, “Exactly! I had to force it out of you.”

Kaito tightens his lips.

“I had to force the words from your lips when we were both drunk, Kaito!” She cries, frustration bleeding through her words. “If the answer was yes – purely  _yes –_ then you would have just said so  _months ago._  But you didn’t and don’t I deserve to know why you made me wait so long?”

Because – because of so many reasons –

Kaito should have to explain himself to her. He doesn’t have to explain everything, because the truth hurts and it’ll tear them apart, whether he approaches it kindly or not.

Because – because how does he explain that Aoko probably thinks he’s selfish, but really, he’s saving himself the devastation when her proclamations of love turn sour, curdling.

“How could I give you the answer, Aoko?” Kaito says, and for a moment, there is heat in his voice, but then, everything goes cold. Not a cruel coldness – an apathetic chill that rises up and leaves him feeling empty. “You hate me. I love you, but how can I say yes to you, when you  _hate me?”_

And there’s his real reason.

How can he admit Aoko’s confession when she hates him as much as she loves him? Because she’s said, time and time again how much she hates KID, how the thief seemed to steal her father from her, how people she works with chides her family for never being able to solve the case.

How can he accept her confession, when her hate for him, is the one reason she became a police office in the first place?

Aoko squints. She says, “If you think I hate you, Kaito, then you’ve really missed the point of my confession.”

Something crawls up his throat, a wail, a sob. Something  _sad,_ and Kaito throws the paintbrush onto the table, drops the palette beside it, and takes a step towards her.

His voice is empty when he echoes, “You hate me.”

“No,” Aoko says, firm, and she reaches out to him, pulls him towards her. “I could never hate you, no matter what.”

“You’re a liar too then,” Kaito says, and he doesn’t let himself get emotional enough, tries to push it down, but it simply rises back up again. Misery, he thinks – yesterday he’d thought he was being tortured, his heart being squeezed, but now. Now he feels something worse. “Because you think that’s true.”

“It is true.”

Kaito blinks, closes his eyes for a second and tries to breath. He feels like he’s suffocating instead.

“I’m the one person you hate most in this world, Aoko.” Kaito says, and he doesn’t know why he’s saying it, it’s a confession of the criminal kind, something he’d promised himself he’d never say to anyone. He’s a liar even to himself, it seems.

This is it, huh. He’s coming clean.

She really will hate him after this, and fuck, Kaito’s probably going to have his criminal record placed against his civilian one, in the same file now, isn’t he?

“I don’t–” She’s smart, but even the smartest people overlook things they don’t want to believe. Kaito knows as much. “You’re not–”

“I’ve never once looked for the spare key to your apartment,” Kaito breathes, “I just break in.”

Aoko presses her lips together, shakes her head. “No–”

“I don’t like hearing about your work day, because I don’t like hearing about thieves getting caught.” Kaito continues, and when Aoko lets go of him, tries to step back, he grabs her instead, keeping her in place. “I don’t like the idea of being  _caught_ for something.”

“Kaito,” Aoko says, “stop it.”

“I don’t like spending time around the police–”

_“Stop it.”_

“–because I am a  _menace to society,_ and I’ve taken up enough of their time already.”

She shudders, pushes against him. It’s not enough to make him step back, and so Kaito stays, watching her. A quiet whisper, “ _you’re lying.”_

“Not this time,” Kaito says. He grits his teeth, hesitates. “You know I’m not lying.”

She lets out a slightly choked cry. This time, when she pushes, Kaito staggers back. “You – You can’t be  _him._ I, that’s not how this is supposed to work. You’re not the bad guy, you’re not the person I’ve been chasing.”

“Well, I’ve never much been one of the good guys Aoko.”

“This isn’t fair.” Aoko whispers. And she lifts her hand, wipes at her cheeks. Fuck, Kaito’s gone and made her cry, he’s horrible, he’s breaking. “It’s cruel. You’re – you’re  _cruel.”_

She spares him a single look before she rushes out.

The door to his apartment slams shut as leaves, and the sound echoes in Kaito’s ears, over and over again. This is what he’d been scared of, this is the result he’d always been dreading, but knowing was always around the corner.

He sinks into the cushions of his sofa, lost in the middle of his home, and buries his face in his hands. His shoulders shake.

_Kaito, shakes._

It’s not fair, Aoko’s right about that much.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while but I'm back. I've added an extra chapter to this, but I doubt you guys mind. Hope you enjoy.

For a few minutes, all Kaito can do is sit, slumped against his sofa, trying to figure out what the fuck has just happened. What he’s allowed to happen.

Then, the few minutes, turn into more than a few minutes.

Into half an hour. Into an hour.

Kaito sits, and he thinks, and eventually, like any criminal who outs himself to a police officer, he begins to get paranoid.

Even with as much of a criminal career as he has, Kaito has never been good at dealing with paranoia. He remembers supressing jumpiness as a child. Remembers watching shadows with a hysterical sort of wariness, making sure they didn’t move in the _wrong_ ways.

His mother had always claimed he had a vivid imagination, that it would fade away over time, but becoming KID had made things even worse. Even eight years later, he watches for reflections from the corner of his eyes, of a gun barrel. He goes rigid at the sound of cars backing up, because they sound like _gunshots._

How could he not get paranoid now that Aoko knows?

She knows who he is – hates him for it – and he’s the one cold case she’s wanted to solve for years. It doesn’t take an overactive imagination to realise what’ll come next.

He shouldn’t be here.

Kaito grabs his paint brushes, leaves them in the water pot – he supposes he’ll have to ask Jii or someone to clean them for him because he probably won’t be able to – and then, grabs a jacket.

Slipping on his shoes, he heads outdoors. And there are no flashing lights, not yet, but the sun shining down on him is bright enough that he blocks the sun out with his hand, trying to shelter himself.

He wishes there was nothing but moonlight, wishes daytime never came around. Moonlight has always been more welcoming, safer, somehow, to a thief who operates in the night.

“I need to get out of here,” Kaito mumbles to himself, as he heads down the stairs of his apartment, making his way out to the main road. Part of him whispers that he should run, that he should put his hood up, hide behind it, but he doesn’t. The smarter, more experienced side of himself knows that acting calm and reassured is half the battle with escaping.

Acting guilty is the first factor in actually being labelled _guilty._

Driving himself isn’t a good idea – the plates on his motorbike are easily found and Kaito doesn’t want to be tracked down any time soon. He just wants to disappear. He wants everything to be okay.

He wants yesterday to have never happened. How would things have turned out if he’d not joined Aoko at her bar, if he’d not given an answer?

Right now, there’s only one person he can trust. Jii, who’s always been there for him, who’s always known what to do when Kaito had been stuck himself.

If he can’t drive, then Kaito will take the subway. It’s always easier to lose a lead on the subway, even if they have access to cameras. By the time they catch sight of him, he’ll be long gone from wherever they’ve sighted him.

* * *

The blue parrot is still, somehow, operational even after all these years.

Kaito pushes through the doors, ignoring the sign labelled ‘closed’ and peeks into the bar. It’s not a big bar, but it’s always felt like it. The building itself is small but the style – western, with a bar at the front and a billiard table located at the end of the bar, just past booths and chairs – has always made it seem larger.

Jii is at the bar, restocking, aged in a way that seems almost ageless.

The door always lets in a small breath of air whenever it opens, a whoosh of sound that lets them know someone’s come indoors. It does so now, too, and despite his age, Jii’s ears are finetuned to catch the sound.

He turns.

“Sorry– we’re still–” A pause as he places down one of his glasses, a smile pulling onto his lips. “Oh, young master Kaito. A pleasure.”

Kaito offers him a smile in return, weak and broken against his lips.

“Yeah,” he says, “sorry for bursting in. I – could really do with an ear and a drink. If you don’t… mind.”

There’s something to say about Jii and that’s that the man is a fucking _saint._ He takes in the droop to Kaito’s shoulders, the paint on his fingertips, and he simply blinks as he registers it all in. He doesn’t ask before the information is ready to be shared, simply gestures to one of the stools.

Kaito practically collapses onto it, slumping against the bar.

“What drink did you want, young master?” Jii asks, watching him for a moment, before turning to his drinks shelf. He grabs two bottles from a box, placing them on the wall. Spirits. “I’ve got either milkshakes or alcohol.”

He knows that it’s a test, almost, for Jii to assess just how okay he is. No questions to his mental state, just a question to what he’s drinking and the answer offers itself without seeming like the bartender is pushing.

“Sake,” Kaito says, after a moment, lifting his head up just long enough to watch the man’s hands slow, hesitating. Then, “I don’t want a lecture about how it’s still early.”

“No lecture,” Jii says, although his tone does seem to border on concerned. Like he wants to remind him that the sun hasn’t even set yet, the day very much still in effect. Kaito doesn’t care.

“Maybe a lecture later,” Kaito says, as a small _ochoko_ cup is placed in front of him, a bottle of sake beside it. It tastes fruity as Kaito sips at it. “Just not now.”

Jii’s expression softens slightly. He says, “sure thing, young master.”

* * *

“She knows,” Kaito says, when the sake has reached his cheeks, a familiar feeling of warmth spreading through his cheeks. It’s okay, he thinks, to be looser lipped when Jii is around. Jii already knows everything incriminating. “Aoko knows.”

He’s leaning against the counter, elbows digging against the surface in a way that’s a little uncomfortable, but not enough that he’s willing to move.

Jii in the middle of washing glasses – how does he _still_ have work to do? It seems almost endless – pauses for a moment. He says, “knows what?”

“About me,” Kaito mutters around his hand, “about KID. I told her.”

A short laugh, misery catching in his throat.

“Why would I do that?” Kaito continues, “I told a _police officer_ who I was. I’ll be arrested and it’ll be my own fault.”

Jii places the glass with the others, grabs another. He doesn’t sound shocked, but he’d been a magician’s apprentice and then a thief’s accomplice, he knows how to mask surprise.

“Maybe you trust her.”

“No,” the word comes too quickly for Kaito to know that it’s a truth he can’t hide from himself. He trusts Aoko, of course he does, but not with this. Not when he knows her morals and how she views KID. “That wasn’t why…”

Jii pauses again. Then: “Then why tell Aoko-san?”

He tries to think through it, tries to decide what exactly the reason was. To make her realise the truth of why he couldn’t answer her, why it scared him so much? Or to show that he wasn’t worthy of her?

“She thinks I’m _good,”_ Kaito says, and the words feel like poison on his tongue, like the concept of being good is so far away from his own personality that he would stop being _Kaito_ if he were. “That I’m – that I’m incapable of doing anything wrong. That I’m worth–”

_Loving._

He cuts himself off.

Jii doesn’t need to hear about his love life, how it’s gone to shit. How it’s going to be non-existent because he’ll be in prison, the woman he loves responsible for putting him there. Perhaps there’s an irony there.

“Ah, I see,” Jii says, and maybe he does. His voice softens, almost sad… _sympathetic._ “Young master Kaito, I suppose you’ve finally accepted than you love Aoko-san, then?”

Kaito blinks. It seems they’re going to be talking about it after all.

“I- Jii, I was never denying it.” He stutters in air. It feels cold in his throat, against the warmth of alcohol under his skin. “I love Aoko, and there’s no point talking about it because nothing will come of it.”

“So, you’ll drink instead?”

Gritting his teeth, Kaito stares at the bar. He says, “okay, fine. I don’t _want_ to talk about it. I just want to forget about ever loving her at all, is that alright with you?”

Jii leans forward, collecting the sake cup and placing it in the sink. It’s replaced with a glass of water. Kaito frowns at it.

“We don’t want to talk about the things that hurt us,” Jii says, “but those are the things we need to talk about the most.”

“No,” the words are quiet.

Jii continues regardless, the words not harsh, or loud, but firm. A tone that makes him listen, regardless of alcohol in his system of not.

“Young master, I’ve watched both you and Aoko-san over the years, just like I watch all my patrons. It’s always been possible to see the devotion she harbours for you.” Kaito shouldn’t flinch at that but he does.

“Well, not now that she knows.” Kaito says. His lips twist into something acerbic, sour. “There’s no fondness for KID.”

“Self-sabotage.”

“…What?”

“What does a person do when they feel undeserving of another person?” Jii says, and the question has already been answered, Kaito knows that, but he grapples for the answer anyway. “They sabotage themselves. That’s why you told Aoko-san the truth.”

No.

He’d told Aoko because he knew she _hated him._ Because he couldn’t only be half-loved, if Aoko were to want him, she’d have to accept all of him, whether he’s reformed or not.

She’d have to accept the darker parts of him, violent acts he’d left behind, revenge he’d forced his morals to shift for.

So, he’d told her, and that hadn’t been self-sabotage, that he been finally _offering the truth._

“Aoko deserves the truth.”

“She does,” Jii agrees. “But if I know the young master, you didn’t tell Aoko-san because you wanted to be open with her. You wanted her to look differently at you.”

Kaito blinks. Finally, he lifts the glass of water, sipping at it so he doesn’t have to find the words.

“I wanted her to see I’m not _good.”_ Kaito mumbles, finally. “I wanted her to realise that she can do better than a thief.”

“As I said, you wanted to sabotage yourself.”

“I can’t _lie_ to her, it’s not sabotaging myself–”

“When we love someone,” Jii says, “truly love them, young master, we tend to want the best for them. We see our own flaws, and we believe that they deserve someone better, so we sabotage ourselves, and we push them away. And we forget, that we’re ruining our own happiness, in the off chance that they could be happier with someone more worthy of them.”

Kaito glances away, down at the floor.

“But young master, you’ve been forgetting the most important thing.”

“What’s that?”

Jii lets out a small sigh. “You’re ignoring that Aoko-san does not want to be with somebody else. Whether they’re more worthy or not, she’s still chosen you. And you’ve chosen her.”

Kaito closes his eyes. He heaves in a breath, holds it in his throat.

After everything he has done, the pain he’s caused Aoko, the things he’s done as KID, he can’t just let all that _go._ Because as much as he pretends to be reformed, he knows that he’d enjoyed it.

There had always been a thrill to being Kaitou KID and he can’t deny that. He won’t. He’s not worthy–

“Love has nothing to do with worthiness,” Jii says. “There’s just two people choosing one another and deciding to do something with it.”

For ages now, it’s felt like loving Aoko had been a question of yes, or no. A statement to be offered when confessed. To be worn with pride, or with nervousness. Something to decide on whether to admit… but maybe… maybe Jii has a point.

Perhaps love wasn’t a statement then. It wasn’t a yes, or a no, but rather, a question. A nudge in the side, a tap on the shoulder with the question of: ‘Are we doing this? Because there’s only so much I can do without having you by my side, and I’m only willing to do so much on my own’.

“You’ve been in a similar situation before then,” Kaito asks. He turns back to Jii now, watches as the bartender pushes his glasses up the brim of his nose. Jii nods. “I want to choose Aoko.”

“Then choose her,” Jii says. “It’s as simple as that.”

It can’t be. It had always seemed so much more complicated than that. Except, maybe he’d been the one overcomplicating it the entire time?

Honestly, it seems like something Kaito would do.

“Okay,” Kaito says, nodding his head. Takes another sip of water. “I’ll do that then.”

Choose Aoko.

If she’ll have him after what he’s told her.

Kaito pushes himself to his feet. Turns to the door. Going to Aoko immediately is a poor idea, he needs more sobriety for something like that, if she’ll take him seriously. But he can also plan. And get things thought out for what he should say.

If he’ll get to say them: Who knows whether he’ll get the chance before he’s arrested?

“Thanks, Jii,” Kaito says. “I’m sorry you had to play matchmaker.”

“Think nothing of it, young master. I promised to offer my support to you in whatever way was required.” A grin. “And either way, now I’ll win a bet with your mother.”

That’s something that Kaito will unpack and react to another day.

He heads towards the door, pulls it open. The fresh air is pleasant against his skin.

“Well I’m off then, seriously, thank you.” He raises a foot but freezes in place. Turning to glance over his shoulder, he says, “Jii – you were in a situation like this before… what did you choose, in the end?”

“I wasn’t the one who had to make a choice, young master,” Jii says. “For me there was never a doubt what my answer would be.”

Kaito nods, hand tightening around the door handle.


	4. Chapter 4

Kaito can’t believe he’s doing this.

But at the same time, he’s always known himself to be the type to do stupid, insane things, so – at the same time, he does believe it. It’s a conflict of belief, one that forces him forward.

He waits until the following morning, of course. When he’s sober and his blood has a lower alcohol content inside, the aftermath of drinking at the blue parrot brushed away with a good night’s sleep and a few painkillers to erase the impending hangover.

Now, he stands outside of Aoko’s front door, early enough that he’d managed to catch the sun rising as he’d left his own apartment behind. The sky had been a mixture of coral and lavender as light peered through, illuminating his face as he’d gotten onto his bike.

“You’re procrastinating,” Kaito tells himself, and he wills himself to rid the tension from his voice, to roll out the ache in his shoulders, where the muscles are so bunched up. The plastic carrier bag that he’s brought with him rustles as he moves, swinging back and forth. “Stop that.”

Okay, he just needs to go for it.

Kaito isn’t a coward, he _knows_ he can do it. Just bridge the gap and hope that Aoko is as much of an early riser as she always claims that she is. He balls his hand into a fist and for the first time in years, he _knocks._

And he waits.

In fact, Kaito waits for long enough that he’s beginning to think that Aoko either isn’t in, or she’s just not an early riser. Which kind of sucks, because Kaito doesn’t really want to wait on her doorstep, waiting for the moment she becomes available for him to talk to again.

He’ll do it, because he’s trying to prove a point, but that doesn’t mean he really _wants_ to. Even if it’s light outside, there’s still a chill to the morning that he doesn’t usually see at midday.

Part of him considers lifting the pick set from his back pocket and just entering the house, but that’s probably not the best idea when he’s trying to even things out. Trying to make sure that Aoko sees him on _her_ terms.

Well–

Okay, maybe it’s not so much _her terms,_ since he’s the one initiating the contact, but… well, he’s trying to make her feel comfortable, in her own space. Somewhere she can kick him out of whenever she wants to stop looking at his face.

The door swings open and Kaito, pulled from his thoughts, jumps back, almost tripping over the curb and back into the street.

Aoko, still dressed in her pyjamas – a long baby-blue shirt with the words _‘I am enough’_ printed across them, and small white kitten shorts – stares out, barely awake.

He kind of gets the impression that either Aoko has only been up a little while, _or,_ he’s the one responsible for her leaving the warmth of bed blankets behind.

“Ka–” Her expression shifts from sleepy to annoyed in a way that Kaito is all too used to. “What are you doing here?”

Kaito takes the second to lift the carrier bag, lets his lips twist upward in an attempt at something apologetic. He’s never been good at saying the words _‘sorry’,_ but he’ll try to, for her. “I thought I’d bring breakfast.”

Aoko blinks. She lowers her chin, staring at the bag as if it holds more answers than he does. “Wha- Kaito, it’s _six in the morning.”_

“Breakfast starts from five-thirty,” he says. And then, quieter, “I wanted to talk, and I’m impatient.”

Her exasperation flees her face, chased away by regret and a frown. Aoko says, “right, whatever, close the door behind you, I’m gonna go get dressed.”

Kaito barely has his foot in the door before she’s disappeared down the corridor, practically storming away. He deposits his shoes, mutters _‘sorry for intruding’_ under his breath, and closes the door behind him.

* * *

When Aoko comes back downstairs, into the kitchen, she is more presentable.

The knots are brushed out from her hair, the tiredness is gone from her eyes and she’s dressed in jeans and a jumper. The jumper, with stripes, is one that Kaito has mentioned being too big for her in the past.

It kind of makes him imagine her wearing his clothes, because the fabric is baggy and sort of swallows her up.

Which is something he shouldn’t be thinking of at the moment, there’s a reason he’s here, and thoughts like that can come later, if everything goes well. God, Kaito hopes it goes well.

“Breakfast at _six a.m.,”_ Aoko mutters as she glances at the food Kaito has prepared, warmed up on the table. “Breakfast at fucking _six a.m., with KID, who just so happens to be Kaito.”_

Okay, so maybe six a.m. breakfast has the beginnings of a mental breakdown in it. He probably should have expected this.

“Yeah,” Kaito says, “come sit down. It’s your favourite!”

Aoko squints. She says, “I’m pretty sure pancakes are your favourite.”

“We’re sharing,” Kaito says, waving a hand past the pancakes on their plates, to the other food on the table. “There’s also egg omelette, and rice porridge here, isn’t there?”

“You never make porridge,” Aoko says, slowly. She pulls out a chair, hesitating. Kaito doesn’t blame her for it.

“I made it today,” he shrugs his shoulders. “I make it sometimes.”

Having her sit down shouldn’t feel so satisfying, but honestly, it warms him slightly when Aoko pulls her chair in behind her. She grabs one of the porridge bowls, settles it in front of her, and grabs a spoon.

“You used the setting for it on the rice cooker, didn’t you?” She says, raising an eyebrow. “I doubt you even know how to cook it properly.”

“I can cook.”

“Doubtful.”

Kaito opens his mouth, retort on the tip of his tongue, and pauses. Are they really going to act like yesterday didn’t happen, just fall back into a routine that feels almost foreign now.

Even if Aoko had mentioned his being KID, she’d given in too easily, hadn’t said anything about it further. Not denying it, but not exactly accepting it either.

His expression falls, and Kaito frowns at his pancakes. He hadn’t really felt like eating before arriving, nor when he’d been setting the food out, but he’d convinced himself that he’d have some food anyway. For an attempt at normalcy.

Now, he doesn’t really feel like there’s even a slither of appetite left.

“Right,” Kaito pauses, pokes his chopsticks into his pancake. “Aoko – I think we need to talk.”

“About how you need to learn how to cook?” Her voice sounds almost strained as she says it, and she fills her mouth with porridge so she doesn’t have to say anything else.

“About me being KID.” Kaito says. Quiet. His voice barely above a whisper.

“I don’t want–” Aoko’s expression darkens. For a moment, it seems like the reminder steals the light from her eyes. “I just want to have breakfast, and not… talk about _that.”_

He can’t deny that the idea of skirting around it forever, neither of them mentioning it, sounds… like it would be a lot easier. But Kaito can’t _do_ that. He can’t leave this hanging, not when this could have all been avoided if he’d just been… open from the beginning.

Again, he pokes at his pancake, before placing his chopsticks down and looking her in the eye.

“I don’t really think we can avoid it,” Kaito says. “Well, we can, but I don’t really think that we _should._ ”

Aoko settles her spoon on the table.

“Well, what do you want me to say?” Her voice is weak, the words wavering, not nervous, but pained. It hurts to know that he caused that. “You lied to me for _years,_ and the only reason you told me was because you wanted to _hurt me.”_

“Aoko, I–”

“Because that’s it, isn’t it?” She cuts him off, and it’s not hard to realise that she’s been sitting on these words since she left yesterday, letting them stew, designing just what exactly she wants to say. “You get upset and rather than explain things rationally, you lash out instead.”

God, Kaito doesn’t know what to say now.

“I mean, you’ve had over eight _years_ to tell me you were KID,” Aoko says, “but you chose _yesterday_ to tell me. You lied to me, and you used the truth to punish me for loving you?”

No. No Kaito hadn’t meant to – that’s _not –_

“I don’t want to punish you,” Kaito says, “I wanted you to realise you deserve better.”

“Did you ever think that maybe it’s not up to you to decide who I deserve?” Her voice is sharp, loud. It echoes in his ears. “You think there’s some goddamned _hierarchy_ deciding who deserves who? Of course not!”

“You hate KID!”

Aoko leans forward, pressing against the table as she pitches herself up, standing, staring down at him. As if she’s incapable of sitting still, of remaining sat in place. “Well, I love _Kaito!”_

Brain short-circuiting, Kaito blinks. He’s never known how to deal with this, with the vivid ferocity in which Aoko feels things, and as such, he feels his brain scramble, frying as he tries to keep up.

“That doesn’t change things,” Kaito says, finally. “You hate KID. You can’t pretend that loving me doesn’t mean you hate me too.”

She stiffens. Drops back into her seat almost as if her legs have given up on her, the muscles weak as she collapses down. Kaito almost wants to ask if she’s okay – but that would be stupid? Wouldn’t it?

How could she be, right now?

“Of course, I hate you,” Aoko says and Kaito can’t hurt the stab of pain that runs through him, slicing him open, making him feel like he’s bleeding out at the kitchen table. “You can’t expect me not to.”

Kaito closes his eyes, reminds himself to breathe.

“I mean,” Aoko continues, and her voice is softer now, “I’ve hated KID for… Pretty much a third of my life, I can’t just will that away in a day.”

…What?

“There’s always going to be residual anger there,” Aoko says, and when he reopens his eyes, she’s watching him, trying to read his expressions. Kaito, used to hiding emotions away, finds that it’s not too unsettling to let her. “But I think we should both be expecting that, shouldn’t we?”

“It’s only natural,” he murmurs.

“And honestly,” Aoko continues, “I think it might take me a while to figure all this stuff out. I mean, you lied to me for years, you – it was _your_ heists my dad was always ditching me for. And I mean, Dad always told me KID was in danger, so that means _you were running into danger.”_

“…I was.”

“I’m not going to lie and say that I don’t hate you a little bit for that,” Aoko says. “That you put yourself in danger, that dad focused more on you, that I was alone because of it. But – some of that anger is irrational, and I know that.”

She leans forward, snaking her hand around the plates and bowls, grabbing hold of Kaito’s hand. He tenses, an unconscious response, but she pays the movement no mind.

“You’re allowed to feel angry,” Kaito sighs, “anger isn’t irrational.”

“And I’ll let myself feel that,” Aoko agrees, “but I know when I need to admit some things are irrational. Like – my anger at dad choosing to go to all the heists and not come home. It was always easier to place it on KID, than on him, so I did. That wasn’t you.”

It is easier, after all, to place the blame on someone who isn’t present, isn’t a part of her life with any immediate relationships. Easier for Aoko to shift the blame and to avoid being angry at those she’s closest too.

“Okay,” – his voice sounds hollow to his own ears – “yeah, that’s understandable.”

A pause.

“So, what happens now?”

Her lips part, eyes widening. Aoko asks, “what do you mean?”

“I mean – with this. With KID. Me.” Kaito’s foot taps against the floor, his shoes clacking, a fast rhythm that isn’t enough to alleviate the sudden anxiety. “I mean, I’m a _criminal,_ a thief – and your division catches them. So, what next?”

The fact that Aoko pauses, considering, her eyes glancing away as she thinks, shouldn’t be as nerve-wracking as it is. But Kaito can’t deny that it’s sobering, watching her.

“Well, it’s not like I can arrest you,” Aoko says. “I don’t have any evidence that KID is you. Well, I have a confession, but there’s no recording of it, so it would just be my word against yours.”

Kaito takes in a deep breath. Holds it for five seconds, and then exhales for eight.

Then, with a quick flourish of his wrist, a magic trick he’ll give no explanation for, he places KID’s monocle on the table. Aoko lets out a small gasp as it clinks against the wood, staring at the eyewear as if it’s going to disappear if she doesn’t watch it.

“There’s your evidence,” Kaito whispers. He lets out a shaky breath. “Aoko… You’ve wanted to catch KID for a very long time… so… if you want to catch me, then the evidence is yours.”

Conflict.

That’s the only word Kaito can think to explain what flashes across her face, pained conflict that threads her brows together, her lips pursued.

“I guess this is the part where you plead your case to me. Why I shouldn’t arrest you?”

Kaito shakes his head. “No.”

“Okay then,” Aoko says. She brushes hair from her eyes, looping it around her ear. “Then answer a question for me. KID has been gone for a while now, you left that moniker behind… Do you think your reformed?”

It’s a question that honestly, Kaito has been asking himself for years now. Something he’d never really wanted to get into, because he’s always been nervous what the answer would be.

But now, he kind of knows what that answer is.

“Honest?” He glances away, “I don’t think so.”

Aoko’s smile tightens, and it’s all Kaito can do to force himself to look back at her. To try and read her eyes, no matter how difficult that is.

“I can’t deny that I enjoyed it, being KID. That there isn’t a part of me that looks back on my heists and wants to host another. In a way, I don’t think I’ll ever be reformed, because there’s always going to be a part of me that loves being that person.”

“Then why stop?”

Truthfully? Because there’d been no way to justify it after he’d found Pandora. Because there was no need to keep risking his life once he’d gained his justice – _his revenge –_ and he’d known that. Because his mother had been worried that one day he’d end up like his father, dead, leaving her even more alone.

So many reasons. All of them mingling together. Only one of them to do with Aoko.

“I found what I was looking for,” he answers. “There was no need to do it anymore.”

“Okay,” Aoko says, “that was then. What stops you now?”

The answers are fluid, readily available without even needing to be thought out. Almost as if for years he’d been dying to say them, except, no one had ever thought to _ask_ because they either didn’t know to or didn’t think the question was necessary.

“I want to be better. I don’t want my own personal history to always be defined by KID. I don’t want to be a _thief_ forever.”

“I don’t know what reformed means in your head,” Aoko says, “but to me, it sounds like your well on your way.”

She lets go of his hand, collects the monocle in her hands. And then, just as quickly as picking it up, so presses it into Kaito’s hand.

“This is yours. Not mine.”

Kaito blinks. “You– Aoko are you–”

“I’m sure.” Her eyes light up, and for a moment, all Kaito can do is watch her. The curve of her lips, not a full smile, but the beginnings of one. Something that can be built upon, with so many different expressions that it’s shocking to think that it’s not overwhelmingly expressive in its own right.

He puts the monocle away, dropping it into his pocket. He hardly feels the weight of it.

“…So, what else is stopping you?”

Kaito frowns, “excuse me?”

Aoko smiles. The first full smile during their conversation. Brightening, reminding him of sunshine. Sometimes, it’s shocking to remember that she has dimples, like he should have known that, like it’s something he should never have overlooked.

She’s as she usually is.

_Beautiful._

“Well, you said that you would ruin me. And I would ruin you.” Kaito’s lips part, but no words come out. “But I don’t feel altogether ruined. So, tell me, what else is stopping you?”

“Nothing,” Kaito says. “Nothing at all.”

 

_**~Fin~** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Notes:
> 
> Because I know that some people might be wondering why I decided not to go with a traditional, overly romantic ending: Well, because Aoko has only just found out the truth about KID. It would be unnatural and frankly, a little unhealthy if they just ended things on an overly romantic note. Did I want kisses and hugs? Sure? But in this fic, it would be unrealistic.
> 
> The fact that they both admit at the end that nothing is holding them back - Aoko is not ruined, and nothing is stopping Kaito - shows that they're still prepared to give things a shot and that their feelings are still present. In the end, they choose each other, and that's it. And honestly, I think that this is a more realistic and fitting end to this fic.

**Author's Note:**

> The author loves reviews.


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